In the afterglow of Darryl Sittler’s 10-point game, a local writer predicted the record would still be alive when humans reached Mars.

Nearing the 40th anniversary this Sunday, seven probes have reached The Red Planet, a movie about settlement there is up for an Oscar and Sittler’s record still stands. The celestial bodies never aligned as perfectly as for Sittler against Dave Reece and the Boston Bruins on Feb. 7, 1976.

Sittler’s six goals and four assists have survived the coming and going of Wayne Gretzky and Mario Lemieux, the arrival of 12 more teams since ‘76 and the accompanying sieve expansion goalies.

Now, with the shift from the scorer friendly ‘new NHL’, post ‘04-05 lockout, the league is locked down with iron clad defensive schemes and giant netminders.

The 65-year-old Sittler’s mark seems safer than ever.

“It seems extraordinary to me, but there’s a higher percentage now it won’t be beaten,” Sittler agreed. “But in sports, you never say never. When Rocket Richard had eight points in 1944 (the first player to get that many), the league was low scoring. Who saw that game coming? Then there’s Sam Gagner a couple of years ago (the last of nine players since Sittler to reach eight). Would you have thought he’d be the one to come that close when Crosby and Ovechkin are still capable? Did he go to the rink thinking he’d get eight? You just never know.”

Sittler was shocked when The Hockey News informed him 9,453 games had been been played between Richard’s eight-point game and his 10 and that just under 39,000 will have gone in the books at the conclusion of play this Sunday.

Sittler wasn’t quite expecting a career-changing moment the night he almost brought down Maple Leaf Gardens. His young son Ryan had fallen in the mud at home which required a major clean-up and while running errands in the morning, Sittler was ruminating about Harold Ballard’s latest headline grab. The owner criticized Sittler’s play with the new captain stuck on one goal in eight games.

“If we could find a centre, we’d be dynamite,” zinged the boss.

Sittler, who’d played one unremarkable game on a new line with Lanny McDonald and new winger Errol Thompson, had asked coach Red Kelly not to break up the trio.

Kelly’s decision to stand pat became part of the game’s lore, though not as much as Don Cherry’s unwitting contribution in picking that evening’s goalie. Feeling smug about his Bruins’ seven-game win streak and with Gerry Cheevers just back from the WHA’s Cleveland Crusaders, Cherry thought he’d save ‘Cheesie’ for a big homecoming at Boston Garden. Reece would get the start before returning to the minors. Reece was on something of a roll, 14 NHL games, with seven wins and two shutouts.

Sittler recalled his only switch in pre-game routine that day was Swiss Chalet take-out chicken and fries that he hurriedly ate in the front seat of his car on the way home to nap. The restaurant chain could have dined out on that endorsement to this day, but Sittler still can’t fathom his King Midas touch that night.

“I could study the replays of that game again and again,” Sittler has told The Sun. “But as much as people fault Reece, it was just a night where every shot and pass somehow found their way to the right place.

“I was finding the corner of the net, banking them in off the post. Reece was screened a couple of times, but he didn’t really flub one goal. Look at my face on the 10th point when I tried to pass in front and it hit Brad Park’s skate. The smile and shrug say it all.”

It was only 2-1 after 20 minutes, with Sittler assisting on goals by Thompson and McDonald. Ballard picked that night to surprise the crowd with a recorded bugle ‘charge’ after each home goal that misfired on its first two attempts. The second period became pure insanity, nine total goals, six by the Leafs, including the first of two Sittler hat tricks. They included goals on an intercepted pass and one where he’d jumped on as the sixth man during a delayed penalty.

Cherry did look Cheevers’ way once during the carnage, but the latter playfully threw a towel over his face. Reece stayed in.

In the crackling Leaf room during the second intermission, media relations man Stan Obodiac informed Sittler he was a point away from tying Richard’s record, that had been matched by one-time Leaf Bert Olmstead. It took just 44 seconds from puck drop for Sittler to join them, what he called his best goal of the night, going around the B’s defence at full speed.

Then came the two magic bullet goals, a 40-foot wrist shot along the ice just inside the post and the centring attempt that glanced off Park. The final tally: Leafs 11, Sittler 10, Bruins 4.

“It’s like his shots were directed by radar,” said astonished Bruin Andre Savard.

Rarely since 1967 had the staid Gardens heard a roar such as followed the 10th point. The bugle call, cleaned up and sounding at top volume every few moments punctuated the standing ovation. Clutching a champagne bottle someone brought from the Hot Stove Lounge, Sittler tried to explain to Hockey Night In Canada’s Dave Hodge what had just happened.

He’s still trying 40 years later.

THE BIGGEST REGRET

One of Darryl Sittler’s greatest regrets is that he can’t sit down with his grandchildren and watch comprehensive video of the greatest one-game performance in NHL history.

His VHS custom copy of the 10-point game, believed to be the only one of its kind, has disappeared through a combination of limited 1970s technology that didn’t allow for mass reproduction and Sittler’s own negligence. But he wanted to debunk the myth he’s sitting on the tape to increase its value rather than share it with fans.

“I’m glad to be asked this, because people might think I’m hanging onto it,” Sittler said. “I did have it, in a box with tapes of my Canada Cup goal and other stuff. But I’ve moved a few times (between Toronto and Buffalo and back) and when I went to look where I thought it was, it was gone.

“Did I loan it and forget to get it back? Is it stuck in an old VCR somewhere? Did it fall down the side of a couch? Hopefully, it re-surfaces sooner or later somewhere in my things. I feel really bad, but ultimately, I’m the one responsible.”

Thankfully, edited highlights of all 10 points are in circulation. But Sittler enjoyed having something more in depth to share with family and friends. At some stage in the ‘80s, a buddy in the business did transfer the game or most major moments from the two-inch or 3/4 tape used in 1976 to VHS. But it never took the next leap to going on a disc.

Up to 1972, CBC’s Hockey Night In Canada preserved all games on kinescope. A 16-mm movie camera was positioned facing the TV, saving it on black and white. But taking up four reels per game was too cumbersome, so the switch to two-inch tape was made, allowing for colour. If highlight tape of a particular goal were needed, they’d be physically cut out. Gradually, tape became smaller, but with an increase in programming, CBC recycled by recording over other games or shows. That’s likely what happened to the tape of the Boston station that was feeding the 10-point game back to New England.

Paul Patskou, Canada’s leading hockey film archivist, believes he has something very close to Sittler’s version, an eight-minute special introduced by HNIC’s Jack Dennett, likely put together later in 1976. Some fans might recall it being shown at the old Hockey Hall Of Fame on the Exhibition grounds. It shows all 10 points, includes play-by-play from Bill Hewitt, commentary from Brian McFarlane, multi-angle replays, crowd shots and Sittler close-ups.

But a full-length copy?

“People would kill for that,” Patskou joked.

10 POINTS ABOUT 10 POINTS

Ten points about Sittler’s 10 point night:

1. Sittler had just one goal in eight games coming into that night.

2. Borje Salming and Lanny McDonald also had four-point games against Boston.

3. Sittler joked with Dave Hodge after the game that he wouldn’t donate his stick to the Hall of Fame right away because “we need the wins”. It was given to trainer Joe Sgro, who said he it went up in a garage fire years later.

4. The 10th-point puck and the sweater he wore that night were also lost.

5. Regular winger Tiger Williams, bumped by Errol Thompson that night, was a minus-2 in the 11-4 win.

6. Harold Ballard, who was mocking Sittler’s goal slump before the game, gave him and wife Wendy a 200-year-old English silver tea service in recognition of the feat.

7. A children’s book about the game ‘My Leafs Sweater’ was written by Mike Leonetti in 1998.

8. George Ferguson, from Inge Hammarstrom and Scott Garland, was the only Leaf goal not involving Sittler.

9. Dave Reece still made 29 saves in the game, one more than Wayne Thomas of the Leafs.

10. The Leafs played the next day against Minnesota and Sittler had just one assist and one shot off the post.

Forty years since Leafs' star Sittler's record 10-point game

In the afterglow of Darryl Sittler’s 10-point game, a local writer predicted the record would still be alive when humans reached Mars.

Nearing the 40th anniversary this Sunday, seven probes have reached The Red Planet, a movie about settlement there is up for an Oscar and Sittler’s record still stands. The celestial bodies never aligned as perfectly as for Sittler against Dave Reece and the Boston Bruins on Feb. 7, 1976.

Sittler’s six goals and four assists have survived the coming and going of Wayne Gretzky and Mario Lemieux, the arrival of 12 more teams since ‘76 and the accompanying sieve expansion goalies. Now, with the shift from the scorer friendly ‘new NHL’, post ‘04-05 lockout, the league is locked down with iron clad defensive schemes and giant netminders. The 65-year-old Sittler’s mark seems safer than ever.

“It seems extraordinary to me, but there’s a higher percentage now it won’t be beaten,” Sittler agreed. “But in sports, you never say never. When Roc